The Augustan Revolution
person.^17 Then from ..onwards almost every single issue of official
Romancoinage,ingold,silver,andbronze,portraysOctavian—Augustus.^18
Thestoryofthenon-RomancoinageoftheEmpireisifanythingmoredra-
matic.^19 Before..theremayhavebeenafewcontemporaryportrayals
of PompeyandCaesaroncitycoinages;therewereafewof MarcusAnto-
nius,andperhapsoneofOctavian.Butbetween..and..portrayals
ofAugustusareknownfromdifferentplaces.Thoughsomecities(such
asTyre, a free city) continued to mint without the head of Augustus, and
other places produced some coins with and somewithout his portrait,we
shouldnotminimizethecolossalchangewhichhadcomeoverthesymbolic
characterof the coinage, both Roman and non-Roman.The term ‘‘propa-
ganda,’’ often used of coin types and legends, seems to me unhelpful; we
knowneitherwhodecidedthesemattersnorwhatreactionstheyevoked.
Whatwehaveisonceagainasetofvisibleanduncontrovertibleexamples
ofhowpeopleconstruedtheworldinwhichtheylived;or,toputitanother
way,ofthesymbolswhichtheythoughtitappropriatetodisplaypublicly.
InthislightitisthereforeofsomeimportancethatbothRomanandcivic
coinagesofAugustus’reignmayalsoportrayothermembersof hisfamily,
Livia,AgrippaPostumus,GaiusandLucius,andTiberius.^20 GaiusandLucius,
togetherorseparately,appearonthecoinsofmorethanthirtycities.^21
That fact has its own importance, since, as we will see, it is clearly re-
inforcedbyotherevidence.Forthemomentitisenoughtosaythatifpro-
vincialsonthestreetsofJerusalem,oranywhereelseintheEmpire,imagined
theirpaymentoftributeas‘‘givingtoCaesarthatwhichwasCaesar’s,’’itwas
a forgivable mistake, and a highly significant one. In fact even the tribute
oftheimperialprovincesdidnotactuallybelongtoCaesar,whateversome
confusingmoderntheoriesmayhaveclaimed.Butwiththatwehavetoturn
tothedivisionoftheprovincesin..Heretoowewillcomeroundin
theendtoasignificantmistakeormisconstruction,thistimeembodiedina
majorcontemporarydocument.Wewillalso,lookingatthenewstructure
. See M. H. Crawford,Roman Republican Coinage(), –; for the gold statue
portrayingFlamininus,notaRomanissue,seep..
. Forthemostcompleteaccount,seeC.H.V.SutherlandandC.M.Kraay,Catalogue
of Coins of the Roman Empire in the Ashmolean MuseumI:Augustus (c. ..–.. )().
. ForaveryusefulsurveyoftheciviccoinportraitsofAugustus,seeS.Walkerand
A. Burnett,Augustus: Handlist of the Exhibition and Supplementary Studies, British Museum,
Occasional Papers(),–.
. See,e.g.,C.H.V.Sutherland,Coinage in Roman Imperial Policy, BC–AD (),
chap.,fortherepresentationofdifferentmembersofAugustus’familyonRomancoinage.
. WalkerandBurnett(n.),–.